Florence- Lauderdale Public Library Digital Archive Interview with Wayne Haggard and Shannon Haggard November 19, 2007 Waterloo, Alabama Conducted by Patti Hannah and Rhonda Haygood Clip 2 of 11
Wayne Haggard: Uh, basically what we find down here around from say below Pickwick Dam and the Tennessee River up to
Shannon Haggard: Wilson Lake
WH: Up to Wilson Lake. This is the type shells that comes out of there. Each one of them has got a name. This is a pistol grip, that’s a snout, five ridge, three ridge. That’s a pigtoe like that one over there. Uh
SH: Ebony
WH: Ebony, maple leaf, wardy back pink, washboard, elephant ear, butterfly, monkey face,
SH: Wardy uh, white monkey face
WH: Yeah, white monkey face, uh wardy back white. What do you call that?
SH: Three horns
WH: Three horns. This is a banana shell, that one I’ll not name. Sheep shank, is that what that is? Or is that a rabbit’s foot?
SH: [ inaudible] a lady finger
WH: A lady finger. These over here are paper shells, they’re real thin. The only one of them we could sell is this one and it’s called a heel splitter.
SH: This is called a granny board here. WH: Yeah, a granny board and it just
SH: Like this, except it’s thinner. WH: I heard this one is called a sand shell or something. They’re real thin and they are not worth anything.
PH: Right, uh, Okay.
WH: This shell at one time, open like this, brought seven dollars and fifty cents a pound. And that shell together, let me right step over here and let you pick one of these shells up
PH: Okay.
WH: So I can show you, pick that shell up. At seven dollars and a half a pound.
PH: Oh, my goodness!
RH: Oh, that’s heavy ( laughter) SH: They were about nine, about nine fifty a pound with the meat still inside but—
WH: With the meat still inside.
SH: That’s open
WH: Feel how thick that shell is right there that’s—
RH: Oooh!
WH: It’s—
PH: My goodness!
WH: That is, actually that’s a monster. We use them for ash trays and everything else. [ laughter] It got to where we could not sell a dead shell. That shell is no good. It, ah, it’s been dead and it’s got wear and tear, you might say. They don’t break good. What I mean by that, we used to sell dead shells but they would take at a piece of metal and they would hit that shell and it would break. It needs to break like glass. Solid, you know. The deader the shell is, it gets chalky, and no good.
SH: It’s flakey when it breaks.
PH: Flakey.
WH: Yeah, it’ll flake, it’ll have little flakes sticking all out in it.
RH: Humm.
WH: But take a shell like this, they got a machine in Japan, and we also have a place in New Johnsonville, Tennessee that they call Little Japan because they are growing cultured pearls. That’s the whole reason for these shells. That’s all they want, the shells to make cultured pearls mostly. They make costume jewelry. Used to they made buttons. They use ever piece of the shell that is big enough to do anything with in Japan. Probably pay twenty- five cents a hour, you know, for those folks to work, to do this. But whatever is left of anything they can’t use they grind it up and make chicken feed out of it. So, nothing is wasted.
RH: I’ve never heard of that.
WH: They’s just a few kind that we can sell. After they went on the endangered list, we could sell washboards, we could sell the monkey face. This is a mule ear [ laughter] believe it or not.
PH: Different from the pig’s ear WH: It’s a white, next door neighbor to the elephant ear. See they’re, they’re all different colors. And I dove, or brailed and dove for years and years and years, couldn’t sell one of these wardy back purples until what, three or four years ago? SH: I don’t think they ever bought them. WH: I thought they bought them. SH: Unh uh. WH: They never, never have bought them? SH: Unh uh. WH: Okay, they’s one of them, it was this one, I guess that was the one they started buying. SH: The elephant ears. WH: It was the elephant ear they started buying. This shell is actually no good. But since I brought this one in, they have put these on the endangered list. [ laughter] Uh, but the elephant ear we can sell them. This is a butterfly we can sell it, the monkey face, the washboard, pig toe, ebony, maple leaf here. They got to where they would not buy the snouts. And them, I don’t even know. SH: Pistol grip. WH: Pistol grip, I don’t even know whether they’ll buy them or not but the three ridge and the five ridge is good shells. They’ll buy them. At one time, they bought the heel splitter, but it’s a come and go, sometimes they’d buy them, sometimes they wouldn’t. SH: Actually, they predict where we work. PH: Do they? SH: I mean, they say well we need, like last summer we went down on the Alabama River and dove and uh, we dove for the ebony shell. They wanted that particular shell so we just forgot about the alligators and went down there and made a bunch of money. [ laughter]

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Florence- Lauderdale Public Library Digital Archive Interview with Wayne Haggard and Shannon Haggard November 19, 2007 Waterloo, Alabama Conducted by Patti Hannah and Rhonda Haygood Clip 2 of 11
Wayne Haggard: Uh, basically what we find down here around from say below Pickwick Dam and the Tennessee River up to
Shannon Haggard: Wilson Lake
WH: Up to Wilson Lake. This is the type shells that comes out of there. Each one of them has got a name. This is a pistol grip, that’s a snout, five ridge, three ridge. That’s a pigtoe like that one over there. Uh
SH: Ebony
WH: Ebony, maple leaf, wardy back pink, washboard, elephant ear, butterfly, monkey face,
SH: Wardy uh, white monkey face
WH: Yeah, white monkey face, uh wardy back white. What do you call that?
SH: Three horns
WH: Three horns. This is a banana shell, that one I’ll not name. Sheep shank, is that what that is? Or is that a rabbit’s foot?
SH: [ inaudible] a lady finger
WH: A lady finger. These over here are paper shells, they’re real thin. The only one of them we could sell is this one and it’s called a heel splitter.
SH: This is called a granny board here. WH: Yeah, a granny board and it just
SH: Like this, except it’s thinner. WH: I heard this one is called a sand shell or something. They’re real thin and they are not worth anything.
PH: Right, uh, Okay.
WH: This shell at one time, open like this, brought seven dollars and fifty cents a pound. And that shell together, let me right step over here and let you pick one of these shells up
PH: Okay.
WH: So I can show you, pick that shell up. At seven dollars and a half a pound.
PH: Oh, my goodness!
RH: Oh, that’s heavy ( laughter) SH: They were about nine, about nine fifty a pound with the meat still inside but—
WH: With the meat still inside.
SH: That’s open
WH: Feel how thick that shell is right there that’s—
RH: Oooh!
WH: It’s—
PH: My goodness!
WH: That is, actually that’s a monster. We use them for ash trays and everything else. [ laughter] It got to where we could not sell a dead shell. That shell is no good. It, ah, it’s been dead and it’s got wear and tear, you might say. They don’t break good. What I mean by that, we used to sell dead shells but they would take at a piece of metal and they would hit that shell and it would break. It needs to break like glass. Solid, you know. The deader the shell is, it gets chalky, and no good.
SH: It’s flakey when it breaks.
PH: Flakey.
WH: Yeah, it’ll flake, it’ll have little flakes sticking all out in it.
RH: Humm.
WH: But take a shell like this, they got a machine in Japan, and we also have a place in New Johnsonville, Tennessee that they call Little Japan because they are growing cultured pearls. That’s the whole reason for these shells. That’s all they want, the shells to make cultured pearls mostly. They make costume jewelry. Used to they made buttons. They use ever piece of the shell that is big enough to do anything with in Japan. Probably pay twenty- five cents a hour, you know, for those folks to work, to do this. But whatever is left of anything they can’t use they grind it up and make chicken feed out of it. So, nothing is wasted.
RH: I’ve never heard of that.
WH: They’s just a few kind that we can sell. After they went on the endangered list, we could sell washboards, we could sell the monkey face. This is a mule ear [ laughter] believe it or not.
PH: Different from the pig’s ear WH: It’s a white, next door neighbor to the elephant ear. See they’re, they’re all different colors. And I dove, or brailed and dove for years and years and years, couldn’t sell one of these wardy back purples until what, three or four years ago? SH: I don’t think they ever bought them. WH: I thought they bought them. SH: Unh uh. WH: They never, never have bought them? SH: Unh uh. WH: Okay, they’s one of them, it was this one, I guess that was the one they started buying. SH: The elephant ears. WH: It was the elephant ear they started buying. This shell is actually no good. But since I brought this one in, they have put these on the endangered list. [ laughter] Uh, but the elephant ear we can sell them. This is a butterfly we can sell it, the monkey face, the washboard, pig toe, ebony, maple leaf here. They got to where they would not buy the snouts. And them, I don’t even know. SH: Pistol grip. WH: Pistol grip, I don’t even know whether they’ll buy them or not but the three ridge and the five ridge is good shells. They’ll buy them. At one time, they bought the heel splitter, but it’s a come and go, sometimes they’d buy them, sometimes they wouldn’t. SH: Actually, they predict where we work. PH: Do they? SH: I mean, they say well we need, like last summer we went down on the Alabama River and dove and uh, we dove for the ebony shell. They wanted that particular shell so we just forgot about the alligators and went down there and made a bunch of money. [ laughter]